Politics Discussion Thread January 2013

OrphanWilde

Top-level comments should introduce arguments; responses should be responses to those arguments.
Upvote and downvote based on whether or not you find an argument convincing in the context in which it was raised. This means if it's a good argument against the argument it is responding to, not whether or not there's a good/obvious counterargument to it; if you have a good counterargument, raise it. If it's a convincing argument, and the counterargument is also convincing, upvote both. If both arguments are unconvincing, downvote both.
A single argument per comment would be ideal; as MixedNuts points out here, it's otherwise hard to distinguish between one good and one bad argument, which makes the upvoting/downvoting difficult to evaluate.
In general try to avoid color politics; try to discuss political issues, rather than political parties, wherever possible.

As Multiheaded added, "Personal is Political" stuff like gender relations, etc also may belong here.

Top-level comments should introduce arguments; responses should be responses to those arguments.
Upvote and downvote based on whether or not you find an argument convincing in the context in which it was raised. This means if it's a good argument against the argument it is responding to, not whether or not there's a good/obvious counterargument to it; if you have a good counterargument, raise it. If it's a convincing argument, and the counterargument is also convincing, upvote both. If both arguments are unconvincing, downvote both.
A single argument per comment would be ideal; as MixedNuts points out here, it's otherwise hard to distinguish between one good and one bad argument, which makes the upvoting/downvoting difficult to evaluate.
In general try to avoid color politics; try to discuss political issues, rather than political parties, wherever possible.

As Multiheaded added, "Personal is Political" stuff like gender relations, etc also may belong here.

How (narrowly) would you define "taking an active role in society"?

explicit political power, implicit power should be made explicit wherever possible.

And yes, I'm specifically claiming that on net people like the latter three have a much larger negative impact than the positive impact of people like the former three.

Your use of the word overpriced and affluent leads me to believe you attach moral significance to parting idiots with their money for baubles. Why? The average wealthy person has a larger positive impact than the average non-wealthy first worlder. I prefer concentrated wealth in the hands of those whose values I share. I have values more likely aligned with that of a tech company CEO than a randomly selected first world person.

And yes, I'm specifically claiming that on net people like the latter three have a much larger negative impact than the positive impact of people like the former three.

...Then I don't understand how your words are at all an objection to my description of emancipatory/socially radical politics. You do understand that, for example, MLK was a radically minded avowed socialist who led a partial social revolution in the US without either violence or "explicit political power"? If you don't find yourself "horrified" by this, then we don't ... (read more)

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Politics Discussion Thread January 2013

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Politics Discussion Thread January 2013

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